


Earth One

by alittlelesspain



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-30
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-12-21 19:27:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11951046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlelesspain/pseuds/alittlelesspain
Summary: Alex Danvers, resident at Central City Hospital and volunteer at the only walk-in metahuman clinic in the city, gets an unexpected visitor. Kara Danvers, on the other hand, gets to see a version of her sister that could have been.Written for the Danvers Sisters Week challenge on tumblr, for Day 2: "I've got you."





	Earth One

Alex Danvers exits out the main doors of Central City Hospital, and heads straight in the direction of the subway, making a note to grab some late lunch at the underground kiosk.

Just as she heads for the barrier to pass through to the train platform, metrocard already extended, her phone vibrates in her pocket, sending Alex immediately backtracking up the stairs for better reception.

“Hello?” she says, after a brief scan of the caller ID, which shows the call to be from Susan Vasquez, the nurse from the walk-in clinic that Alex volunteers at, in-between her shifts at the hospital.

“Tsung had to drop out of her shift at the clinic tonight.” Vasquez starts without preamble. “Some kind of emergency with her kid. I know it’s late notice, but can you fill in?”

Alex dithers.

“Oh, right.” Vasquez says, after a few moments’ silence, as if the thought had just occurred to her. “You were heading out to your folks this weekend, weren’t you?”

“Right...” Alex draws out.

She isn't particularly thrilled about going back back to Midvale and having to see the rest of her extended family, not when her dad is away at a conference, and therefore unavailable to act as mediator, but Eliza Danvers has made a tradition of harrying everyone home for the Thanksgiving weekend each year. Something about keeping up the grand American ways, delivered with just enough irony in her tone, to keep Alex wondering if her mom actually means it, or is just pulling her leg.

Even the prospect of getting to see her mom again, and of getting to tell her about her newest paper that had just gotten accepted pending revisions, is dampened by Alex’s dreaded anticipation of the probing questions about her future career plans and (lack of a) love life.

Sometimes, she wishes that she had a sibling, if only so that it would take the heat off her, just a little.

“Never mind, then.” Vasquez says, as Alex internally weighs the cons of a family get-together against the tedium of heading the clinic on the Thursday night before the long weekend. “I’ll call up Ortiz instead.”

“No.” Alex says quickly, her mental calculations winding down to a decision. The intercity trains run pretty late tonight, owing to the holiday weekend, but if she works the clinic shift until closing, she might miss even the latest one out.

Her mom and her might have their ups and downs, but Alex is fairly sure she wouldn’t fault her for being a day late because of this particular reason.

\---

 

Most of Alex’s shift that night passes uneventfully, or as uneventfully as a shift at a clinic of this sort could. Her last patient of the night, though, is interesting.

Before she goes into the ward to meet them, Alex runs through the preliminary details that had been given to her. The metahuman had been found collapsed on the ground near a high-rise, cradling a broken arm. Alex’s eyebrows raise as she reads the possible cause of the injury, that the nurse had scrawled on the report.

It is the patient that does a double-take, though,when Alex walks into the makeshift ward housing her. Alex sighs, preparing for another fight. Metahumans are infamously stubborn when it comes to accepting treatment.

“Thanks, Vazzy.” she says as an aside to the nurse, before approaching the patient.

Vasquez nods and leaves. The patient propped up on the bed, still in what seems to be her battle uniform and cape, looks between Alex and the retreating nurse with incredulous delight.

 _“Vazzy?_ ” she asks.

“She’s Nurse Vasquez to you.” Alex says, a little puzzled at the overly familiar tone of this stranger. “Now, let’s get started.”

Without further ado, she sits down by the patient and goes over the checklist of pertinent information that Vasquez had given her on the case. The checklist is narrated by the patient in front of her, even as Alex goes down the list.

Alex looks up, partly in annoyance at the interruption.

“I can see through the wood.” the patient says apologetically, nodding at the wooden clipboard that Alex is holding. She squints, and frowns. “At least, I could before my powers burnt out. Also, I remembered giving the answers to the nurse.”

“Okay...” Alex says, momentarily stymied by this unexpected chattiness. “It says here that you’ve hurt your right arm.”

“I’m Kara, by the way.” This side-stepping of Alex’s effort to get back to routine is complemented with the extending of the broken arm to shake, only a slight wince betraying the pain that results.

“I know. It says your name right here.” Alex says, before staring at the arm pointedly until Kara retreats it, looking just a little disgruntled and hurt. “You’ll need to keep that at rest.”

“It’s fine, Alex.” Kara says, huffing. “I just fell.”

Alex consults her notes, again ignoring the familiar way that her name had been pronounced. Kara had obviously gleaned it from her nametag, and for all Alex knows, her injuries might have left her temporarily disoriented enough to explain this over-familiar behaviour.

“You ‘just fell’ from the roof of a fiteen-story building.” she says, a moment later. “What were you even doing up there?”

“Bird-watching.” Kara says blandly.

Alex rolls her eyes. Damn stubborn metahumans. She reaches for her stethoscope, wanting to do a preliminary check of vitals before focusing on the arm, as it doesn’t seem to be an emergency.

So...you work here?” Kara asks, as Alex sets to her routine.

She is looking around the clinic - which is really just a converted warehouse - as she asks this, looking suitably unimpressed. Alex and the others keep the place sterilized, and tidy, but it isn’t possible to do much more, with their budget.

“I’m a volunteer.” Alex corrects. She would have left it at that, but something about the avid way her patient is looking at her makes her elaborate. “I work at the general hospital downtown, but I help out here when I’m free.”

“What is _here_ , then?” Kara modifies her earlier question, sweeping her good arm around the place.

“A walk-in clinic for the extranormally gifted.” Alex says, expanding further when Kara cocks her head, much like a confused dog would. “For metahumans. We treat broken bones to burnt-out powers, and anything in between.”

“I’m the Girl of Steel.” Kara says, sounding quite proud. “My bones don’t break.”

“It’s broken now.” Alex points out - quite reasonably, she thinks - as she gestures at the arm that she’s running trained fingers over.

Kara scowls and hunkers down further.

“Solar flare messed up my powers.” she mumbles, as if that explains everything. “Caught me off guard, and I dropped out of the sky. Breaking my arm in the process.”

Alex nods, as if that sort of thing happens all the time around here, and then tilts her own head.

“Are you one of those metahumans that gets their powers from the sun, then?” she questions, unable to contain her curiosity to merely professional interest. “Like that Apollo guy out in Metropolis? I’ve never seen anyone on the news with that uniform, though.”

She motions down at the red and blue outfit that Kara is wearing, with that weirdly shaped S snaking around her chest.

“Well, yes, you could say I’m new here.” Kara says. “I was hoping to meet up with a friend I know in Central City, but he seems to be out of town.”

“What friend?” Alex asks idly, more to keep herself occupied, and Kara distracted, while she puts her arm in a cast.

Kara’s mouth snaps shut. When she doesn’t say anything, though, Alex keeps her gaze trained on her, until Kara gets a deer-in-headlights expression on her face, at which point Alex decides to take pity on her.

“So how exactly do your powers work?” she asks, changing tracks, as she sets the bone, brushing away a new round of insistences from Kara that she’s _fine_. “Do your cells store the solar energy like a battery, or does it work more like photosynthesis?”

After another long silence, she looks up to see Kara regarding her with a quizzical smile on her face.

“I thought you’d know more about it than me.” she says, with this weird inflection to her tone, like there’s more than a straightforward meaning to the sentence.

“I’ve never met any two metahumans with the same set of powers.” Alex admits. “Whatever triggered the activation of the metahuman gene seems to have affected everyone differently. I always like to take as much notes as I can on each patient, though. Any new information will make it easier to treat the next one that comes along.”

“And you do all this for free?” Kara asks quietly, “On top of your actual work?”

Alex shrugs embarrassedly.

“There’s a few of us, working in shifts.” she says. “The hospitals didn’t really know how to treat metahuman injuries, and a lot of the time, they can’t - or won’t - handle this kind of specialized care on a regular basis. So a bunch of us got together and opened up this clinic, for anyone looking for a specialized kind of medical help.”

She holds back that it had been her father - a pioneer on the subject of metahuman physiology - that had kindled Alex’s interest in the subject in the first place, and encouraged her to start up the clinic.

“That’s ...pretty amazing.” Kara says, looking at Alex with a weird expression on her face now, something like pride, like Alex’s dad had worn when she had first floated the idea of the clinic across him, like Alex wishes that her mom would look at her like more often.

She looks down, embarrassed again, and focuses on getting the cast right.

\---

 

As Alex finishes the checkup and heads out of the ward of her bubbly new patient, Vasquez accosts her.

“We just got a report that a kid collapsed in Ryer Valley Park.” she says. “They say he’s unconscious, but floating a couple feet off the around. We should go pick him up.”

Alex looks back at the ward, catching faint snatches of their only remaining patient humming something to herself, and looks back at Vasquez with eyebrows raised.

“Is she in serious condition?” Vasquez asks. “I can go collect the kid myself, but I was hoping to have backup, just in case.”

Alex hesitates before shaking her head.

“Let’s go.” she says, chivvying Vasquez out the door after a hasty explanation to Kara.

They reach the park within a few minutes, and Vasquez stays in the van by the roadside, while Alex runs in to check on the injured metahuman.

A quick check, and verbal confirmation, shows her that nothing seems to be broken. It seems to be a case of exhaustion, combined with prolonged exposure to the night chill, that had caused his powers to go on the fritz.

“Let’s get you out of here.” Alex murmurs, extending her arms to scoop up the floating body.

She grunts as she stands back up to her full height, the weight more than she’s used to.

“Wow, you’ve really gotten out of shape.” A voice - _Kara_ \- comments from behind her.

“What are you doing here?” Alex demands, as she moves forward with the injured kid, struggling a little. “You’re supposed to be in bed, resting!”

Kara shrugs and ignores that,  looking curiously over her shoulder at the to-be patient.

“Come on.” Alex sighs in aggravation, realizing after a moment that she’s not going to get an answer to her question. “Let’s get going.”

She turns towards the transport van, still struggling with the unexpected weight of the body she’s carrying, but Kara steps in front of her, flexing the fingers of her left arm in an experimental way.

“I don’t think my flight powers are back yet.” Kara says. “But I’m pretty sure most of my superstrength is still intact.”

Alex blinks. _Superstrength?_ How many powers does Kara have in her repertoire? Usually, the metahumans that Alex has studied have very specific areas of strength, not such a broad spectrum of abilities.

Before Alex can recover, Kara has scooped up the huddled child from her arms, supporting most of his body with her left arm, and is striding ahead to the van, as if he weighs nothing at all. Alex can hear her murmuring something to the kid, as she hurries to follow.

“I’ve got you. It’s okay. I’ve got you.”

“Wait up.” Alex calls, scrambling after her, and then quietly, almost to herself. “You can _fly?”_

\---

 

The child’s injuries are all external and mild, which is something of a relief to Alex.

Kara hovers over her like an anxious shadow, as she goes through the usual checking of vitals, and Alex is tempted to snap at her to _go away_. She ends up, though, making Kara her batman instead, calling for tools and first aid supplies that are supplied to her with surprising alacrity, and prepared in the specific ways that Alex likes for each, even though she hasn’t had the time to relay those specifcs to Kara.It’s almost as if Kara has done this before.

Which would be impossible.

After the checkup, and after questioning the sleepy boy about his allergies, Alex instructs Kara to head to the only open burger joint around the area, and grab something for him to eat.

She doesn’t expect Kara to come back with two arms filled with different bags of food.

Alex stares.

“We’re trying to feed him, not kill him with a heart attack.” she points out.

“Oh no.” Kara says, tossing one of the plastic bag towards her. “That’s for him. The rest are for me. I’ll need food if I’m going to get my full powers back.”

Alex watches, in mingled awe and disgust, as Kara polishes off five sandwiches in record time, scarfing them down with obvious relish. Her own stomach grumbles suddenly, and she realizes that she had forgotten to pick anything up for dinner, on top of missing lunch due to her 12-hour shift at the hospital.

Kara looks up, looking a little guilty.

“Want one?” she asks, motioning at the two remaining sandwiches, and her face falls when Alex actually does reach out and grab one of the burgers.

Alex eats while she monitors her young patient’s heartrate, until her replacement for the midnight shift clocks in and chivvies her out, Kara following behind her like a shadow.

\---

 

As she is lingering by the clinic door before exiting, fingers reluctantly weaving through the mass of coats in the closet for her own, the reminder of the ordeal awaiting her at Midvale accosts Alex, and all of a sudden it’s the only thing she can think of.

She looks at her watch, noting it to be a quarter past twelve.

“Well, I’ll definitely have missed it now.” she mumbles, staring out in the general direction of the train station. She could still drive the way home, but better to wait until the morning train.

That’s twelve less hours of being grilled on everything from her career choices to her relationships, and being found wanting.

“Missed what?” Kara says, suddenly appearing next to her

“You’re supposed to be in bed.” Alex sighs.

“I’m fine.” Kara repeats for what seems like the tenth time that night. “I heal fast. What did you miss?”

“Thanksgiving weekend.” Alex says. “I have to make it back to my mom’s, but I’m pretty sure I just missed the last train out.”

“You don’t seem all that put about it.” Kara observes, but she also doesn’t seems surprised by her own observation.

Alex shrugs.

“Not my first choice for an ideal long weekend.” she says, eventually.

Alex wonders, not for the first time, if this is what most families can expect of each other. To profess declarations of missing each other, while secretly dreading the few times they do get together as a family, quailing at the the thought of being secretly sized up at every occasion against every other relative available.

That thought then leads to the unexpected curiosity of what Kara’s relationship with her own family is like, although Alex has more sense than to just blurt out a personal question like that.

She hopes, though, that Kara loves her family.

“Sometimes parents and kids...those kind of relationships can just be fraught you know?” Kara is saying now, the expression on her face suddenly more serious than Alex had ever seen her wear. “Your mom probably thinks the world of you.”

And the weird thing is, Alex knows it. She knows her mom is proud of her, her moms says so often when Alex visits. It’s the small reprimands accompanying the praise that make it hard to swallow, that make Alex feel like a failure even though she intellectually knows that reasoning to be unsound.

She wrestles that maudlin line of thought to the back of her head, and turns her attention back to Kara, only to find the metahuman in question looking westward into the sky, mumbling to herself.

“I have to make it back to the portal in five minutes.” she seems to be murmuring, biting her lips as if in deep thought, “But I’m pretty sure that my superspeed is back at full strength now, so I should still be able to make it.”

She seems to come to a decision, and looks back at Alex.

“You’re not scared of heights, are you?”

“No.” Alex answers instinctively, although between the lateness of the hour and her own exhaustion, she doesn’t immediately cotton on to the reason behind the question

“I didn’t think so.” Kara says, “Now, come on!”

Before Alex can question further, she finds herself being lifted into the air, and then they are flying, _Kara_ is flying, and the entire world is receding away from them, Alex’s anxieties with it.

\---

 

Alex directs Kara to drop her off at the bus station a short way from her parents’, figuring that it would raise less questions, for the night, at least.

“Are you sure this is safe?” Kara asks, landing them both with practiced ease, and looking around her quite doubtfully, at the almost-empty station.

“It’s fine.” Alex assures her. “My parents house is only three minutes away.”

Midvale is farther north than Central City, and Alex shivers just a little in the autumn chill as she answers, feeling exposed in her thin sweater and work slacks.

Kara looks over at Alex, and her face falls.

“I forgot to give you time to get your coat!”

“It’s fine.” Alex says, as flailing hands windmill at her body, as if the motion would somehow generate heat. “I’ll get it when I go back on Monday.”

She repeats the words again, more snappily, when Kara continues fussing, and Kara freezes, before lighting up again.

“Oh, I know!”

Quickly, before Alex can even process what is happening, Kara has unwrapped her cape from her own shoulders, and wrapped it around Alex’s, right over her sweater.

“There!” she says, looking quite pleased with herself, before looking up at Alex anxiously. “I think that ought to last you for the bus drive.”

Alex rolls her eyes, more than a little embarrassed at being taken care of like this, by someone who’s supposed to be _her_ patient.

“I can't accept this.” she says, trying to get the cape off.

"It's my secondary one." Kara says airily. "My usual one is in the wash."

Alex should still decline the offer, give the cape back. That’s what she intends to do at first, but then she feels the material as she's trying to pull it off, and it’s like nothing she’s ever come into contact with, or even heard of. She’s just itching to get to her dad’s lab and put it under a microscope, to study the kind of fibers it’s made of. She’s willing to bet it’s bulletproof.

“It’s the least I could do after you patched me up.”  Kara is saying now, even as the appropriate experiments run in the back of Alex’s head.

“Doesn’t look like you needed it, after all.” Alex says, noticing the way Kara’s right arm already seems to be moving in a natural way that belies any injury , the cast that Alex had put on already bent out of shape by what could only be Kara’s own superstrength.

“Yeah, well.” Kara says sheepishly ducking her head, but looking defensive at the same time, like a kid caught doing something wrong.

“You’ve got somewhere to be, don’t you?” Alex asks, just as her own bus pulls up. She racks her brain for what Kara had been mumbling about earlier. “Some kind of portal?”

Kara looks at her, not seeming surprised that Alex had caught that, and then all of a sudden rushes forward, gathering Alex in an unexpected hug.

“Hey!” Alex says self-consciously, and then hugs her back with some amusement, as Kara clings just a little too tightly. “Go, before you miss whatever it is that you had to catch.”

She shakes her head as Kara whirls back, eyes wide in alarm, and launches herself into the sky at a speed that actually causes enough of a blowback of air to make Alex stumble backwards.

Oh yeah, there’s never a dull day in Central City, with all these metahumans to take care of.

Still...

As Alex gets into the bus, and it speeds through the rural roads towards her childhood home, the cape feels warm, as if the sun is shining on her even in the night, and she realizes that her underlying anxiety about going home suddenly feels _less_.

_I’ve got this._

_\--_

 

When Kara returns to her own world through her portal, it’s around 2am, but Alex is waiting for her, drooping in a chair that she had stationed next to the portal. She looks up as the portal glows at Kara’s exit, and fairly runs towards Kara when she steps through.

“What you were doing there for so long?” she demands. “You’ve been gone for two days.”

Kara blinks.

“It only felt like a few hours to me.”

Alex shakes her head in frustration.

“I should’ve gone with you.” she says, “I should have been there.”

“You were.” Kara murmurs, and then qualifies the statement as Alex raises her eyebrows. “In spirit, I mean. And you know that you were needed here to keep the portal operational.”

“Tell me everything.” Alex says. “Did your Barry have any information he could give us on the Dominators?”

Kara shakes her head.

“No dice. He was out of the city, and I was about to set off to find him when I got...distracted.”

Alex looks pissed, and like she’s going to demand further explanation, when suddenly she droops and sways on the spot, before gathering herself, then swaying unsteadily again.

“Alex!” Kara props her up with one hand, ignoring Alex’s hands shakily waving off the offer of assistance. “What is up with you?”

“Nothing besides exhaustion and lack of food.” J’onn says, appearing suddenly from behind them.

He frowns as Kara jumps, before turning back to Alex with a reprimanding look. “I told you to go home and get some rest instead of watching the portal all night, agent.”

“Aww.” Kara coos. “Were you worried about me, sis?”

“I’ll murder you both in your sleep.” Alex mumbles, but it doesn’t have the usual fire that her threats do.

Kara tightens her arms around her sister, as she stumbles again.

“I got you.” she says lightly.

 _“_ And what took you this long, Supergirl?” J’onn asks, rounding on her now. “You were supposed to find your friend, get the information from him, and get back immediately.”

Behind his sternness, Kara can see the fading worry, which is what actually makes her feel guilty.

“It wasn’t my fault.” she protests immediately. “Barry wasn’t around, and then a solar flare messed my powers up when I was trying to find him. You should be happy I got back to the portal on time.”

J’onn simply rolls his eyes heavenward, and puts out a hand to stop her, as Kara starts walking, supporting a feebly blinking Alex.

“I’ll handle her.” he says, grabbing hold of Alex’s shoulders with startling gentleness, and guiding her towards one of the nearby resting rooms that they usually reserve for guests to the DEO. “You go get whatever happened to your arm checked over at medbay.”

“Soon.” Kara promises. She can’t stop the wicked smile that comes over her face. “I have to go talk to _Vazzy_ first.”

“Medbay.” J'onn repeats bluntly, with an expression on his face like he doesn’t even want to ask what Kara meant by the last sentence. “ _Now.”_

Kara waits until his back is turned before sticking her tongue out at him, and skulking off in the direction of the medical bay.

\--

**Author's Note:**

> Ok listen y'all I'm only on the first season of Flash still, so please don't kill me if I got the universe details wrong. I was keeping them vague for a reason :P
> 
> This is late, but it was written for the Danvers Sisters Week challenge, for the Day 2: "I've Got You." I remembered about the week too late to have anything prepared, but this thing came to me at 3am yesterday, just as I was heading to sleep, so here you go :P
> 
> I can be found, as usual, at @alittlelesspain on tumblr.


End file.
